the drop-dead actress is our cover girl - for a third time!

For November's America issue, we needed a cover girl who was smart, fearless, and cool – essential traits of our readers all over the country. Nursing our True Blood obsession and our thrill of young talent, we turned to Evan Rachel Wood, who's graced our cover three times before. The North Carolina native seemed like a perfect choice to star on our cover – both in her photos and her interview. See snippets of both below, then get the entire story in our November issue, on stands tomorrow.

On Kate Winslet coaxing her into doing a nude scene:“I always had a rule that I was only going to do topless and never the whole package, I have to have some kind of mystery! But she then explained to me what a merkin was…”

On Marilyn Manson“I mean, dating Marilyn Manson… it's kind of impossible to keep that out of the spotlight… He had a hand in raising me! Oh, I'm always gonna love that guy. He's a genius, he's an amazing artist, we're still friends. Some things just aren't meant to be.”

On her next musical role:“I wanna play Janis Joplin. Can I just claim that now please?... Across the Universe is not how I sing- that was very pretty. I sing more like Janis, rough and loud.”

On George Clooney: “He goes, ‘You're really good at going from innocent to sexy in the drop of a hat,' and I was like, ‘I don't know what you're talking about!”